Wow. I had no idea Sarah’s YouTube-posted response to President Obama’s speech would receive such a response. In the 35 hours that have passed since we posted this online, it’s been viewed over 26,000 times, commented on over 350 times, rated over 600 times. And we’re not even 2 days out. Here are the current “honors” given by YouTube, it’s a top “education” category video in over 20 countries presently.

Thank GOODNESS I chose to moderate comments on this video. Good grief there are some heartless folks out there, commenting on YouTube. I’ve tried to filter just those comments which use profanity or are disparaging. I let some of the critical comments through too, if they weren’t too critical of Sarah directly. It’s good to see many people commenting in her defense in those cases.

At some point I may turn commenting off for this video, but for now we’ll let it ride. Is this a good idea to have put Sarah on YouTube? Bad things can certainly happen that are tied to the Internet, but overall I think predator danger fears are overblown.

Will Oprah see this video and want to interview Sarah? Will NewsOK? Will President Obama see it? Who knows… It is great so many people have watched it, and so many have left edifying and supportive comments. In moderating those comments, I’m affirmed more than ever that we are on a holy mission in education, and our work is SO important. In addition to helping people learn FACTS and IDEAS, we also must help others learn RESPECT and understanding. It’s really sad to see how cruel and mean some people can be. Thank goodness for comment moderation!

Alexander: Since you were not able to join Sarah and I to watch President Obama’s speech today “live,” I’d like you to watch the speech and then compose a response you can either post here on Learning Signs, record as a video on YouTube, or record as an audio message via AudioBoo. Let me know if you need help with either option 2 or 3. 🙂

Also check out Sarah’s response, and the comments others have left for her there. She may need to record a follow-up video to answer some of those questions!